


Law is...Dead?!

by TheDoctor1002



Series: Faceless [1]
Category: One Piece
Genre: Betrayal, Death Threats, Fear, Love, Melancholy, Mother-Son Relationship, Nightmares, Other, Protectiveness, Sad, Threats, Watching over, What-If, insane, vow
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-26
Updated: 2016-06-26
Packaged: 2018-07-18 06:28:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,704
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7303207
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheDoctor1002/pseuds/TheDoctor1002
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After long years escaping, Artemis seems to have found peace. She had to go beyond Rocinante's death, despite the fact that it will scar her forever, in order to take care of Trafalgar, too young and now alone.<br/>Years heal her wounds and watching her stepchild growing makes her past's shadows disappear.<br/>A dream, anyway, is enough to awake old fears and a terrible prophecy seems to be about to come true.<br/>What does it really mean, to have the chance of taking a glance over the Future?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Law is...Dead?!

I sit on the mattress with my heart in my throat. My head is spinning and suddenly in my field of vision there's nothing but a pitch black room, but it's not the threathening darkness of a few seconds ago. It's just the calm of my chamber. Just the unruffled quiet of the night. Just a dream, once again.

I keep gazing into the void for a few seconds, stunned by the still-clear pictures from that nightmare. That's not pure imagination, I've learnt how to recognize whenever the Future wants to tell me something.   
"Not him" I whisper "Not again and not him"  
I feel my cheeks burning like a lively flame, warm tears dampened them. I make my way fumbling through that dark room that suddenly feels too small, I walk barefoot along the submarine's hallways. It's like I have to teach to my legs' muscles how to support me, they're shaking and they don't give any sustain to my body. From my mates' rooms comes a quiet snore, it seems like theirs is a restorative and calm sleep.   
When I manage to reach the kitchen, I'm still a bit out of breath and every time I inhale, it seems like my lungs allow less air to fill them.   
I grab a squared bottle from the cupboard. It contains an amber, sweet liquid which is strong enough to heal every kind of hurt, or so they say. I lay my lips directly on the cold glass, taking a long sip of rum in the hope that it can erase those shadows from my mind.   
It's sore, I can clearly feel every drop flowing down my parched throath. For an instant I'm dazed, I perceive nothing but the sugary and strong taste of the liquor, then the alcol strikes right in my head and in my heart. God, what an awful sensation. I'm not very used to spirit and It feels like my brain is about to implode, but it manages to remove the last remainders of that dream: the feeling of blood covering my hands.   
When I try to take another sip, a familiar hand snatches the bottle from my unsteady graps and replaces it with a glass of water.  
"Panic attack's symptoms." the Surgeon of Death diagnoses, casting a long lasting glance over me "Alcool doesn't reduce your adrenaline, you'll only end up with a binge."   
I take small sips and never make eye contact, even if eye contact is clearly what he's looking for.   
"It's already the third time since the beginning of the month" he goes on, scolding me.  
"They're just nightmares" I repeat him for the third time since the beginning of the month "I've always had nightmares. Everyone has them."  
_Who are you talking to, Artemis? To him or to yourself?_  
"Well, they surely became more recurring." The dark haired guy comments, sitting on the kitchen's counter, with his ruffled hair and sharp look "You should talk about them, it would help."  
"You know there are matters I can't talk about" I mutter reluctantly.  
" _Timelady_  matters? Visions?"   
I nod, leaving my glass in the sink "They're horrible things, the ones I see. Shadows i thought far, demons I thought I had forgotten."  
It's useless to even say a name: he already knows. He gives me a kind of glance I can easily recognize: it's the one he casts every time he understands who has taken over my mind, but it's just for a second, his expression softens quickly.   
"It's still very early. The dawn will come in a few hours. If it can calm you, you can come at my place, as we did in the old times."  
A melachonic smile lights up my face. I can well remember when he was still a child and, to keep him quiet and help him to sleep, I used to spend entire nights by his side.   
"Those were different times. Then I was the one taking care of you, not the contrary."  
His lips touch my forehead lightly, an extremely unusual love gesture of him.   
"Sometimes, even grownups need some security" he whispers "We're a family, Artemis. Despite what these last years determined, you're not my babysitter, you're a Heart Pirate and it's my duty, as captain, to make sure that everyone in my crew is well and this includes you as well."  
He offers me his hand, inviting me to follow him. I accept, outlining a feeble smile. He seems relieved by my decision and, it's pointless to deny it: after that nightmare, having him by my side is probably the only thing I need.

His room is untidy, a mess, but incredibly cozy. The duvet clumped on his bed it's the evidence of the briskness with which he arrived rescuing me. Law drags himself to the mattress, laying down slowly and lifting up the blanket. It looks like the wing of an angel. I curl myself up in his arms like a scared little girl and the quilt wraps me up like a shield. I can hear the sound of his beating heart and smell the scent of his skin, I try to compare them to the ones in my memories.   
When he was a child, his pulse was so feeble that I feared for his life at every heart beat, now it's as powerful as a thunderstorm, like it's going to break the prision of ribs in which his heart shakes frenetically. It brings me peace, that throbbing manages to cleanse my mind of my fears way more than all of the rum in the whole Grand Line.  
"You've always done so much for me" he whispers, touching gently the rough fabric of my t-shirt, scanning my back with his hands like he expects to find deep wounds waiting there to be healed.   
"You know what, little doc?" I ask him and, for the first time, my voice shows all the ages my powers manage to hide. He opens his eyes and stares at me, waiting to know "The truth is I'm afraid. I've never been so scared since before Rocinante's-"  
There my voice interrupts, the sentence remains incomplete and broken off by the remembrance of those old days, so damn alike to the present ones. "I've already lost so much because of that man..."   
The cries that resounded in my nightmares are the same that torment my dreams nowdays, the same thick blood stains my clothes, the only difference is in the body I'm holding in my arms. There's no idiom to express this kind of sorrow. It's not the loss of a friend or a relarive, not even my own death would be so painful. It's a black hole that devours my heart bite after bite, that tastes my sufference and satiates of the curses I address to the one man who managed to destroy me.   
Trafalgar hugs me tightly, he lets me hide my face in his collarbones and tries desperately to keep together the pieces in which I'm crushing.  
_Since when is the son who comforts the mother?_  
I had to protect him, give him a sense of safety, but how can I keep on fighting this battle If I can't even keep my sanity?  
"He won't hurt you anymore" he reassures me with a firm voice "I swear I won't let Doflamingo lay a single finger on you. No more."

//

"There are wounds way more painful than any stab, am I wrong, my love?"   
I still can hear his amused voice insinuating in my head, sticking me that name while around me the whole scene comes back to life again. My shaking body, Cora-san's jacket pressed against his chest to stop the hemorrhages, my frightened stare reflected in Doflamingo's mirror glasses.   
"A swift death has been my last present to my little brother. With you it's going to be much funnier: there's no bigger fear in the hearts of men but the one of the unknown. I got to know you, Artemis: I know well what scares you and i know that no torture, no matter how savage, would. But losing someone you love would be a brand different question, wouldn't it?"   
Those words are like a thunder, they strike me making my heart tremble with fear.   
_Little Doc._  
He pulls out his firegun again, he seems to be aiming at me, but then he moves his line of fire of a few centimeters, firing a shot towards the trunks. With the quickest motion that my numbing body allows me to make, i place myself between Law and a bullet that never arrives. Doflamingo cackles to my reaction "You've been so lucky, my love: it was a blank shot. Anyway, you would have taken a bullet to defend the content of those chests despite the fact that gold doesn't need a human shield. This makes me think that you're probably hiding something way frailer than a treasure. A child, maybe? You would have get you killed to keep that ingrate alive. He's the only person you still care about, isn't he? It's going to be funny, seeing you struggling in uncertainty. You will never know when you are going to say goodbye to this life nor how much you will lose before dying. I'll take everything from you: now it's Rocinante, sooner or later it will be that brat you care so much about, in the end, if I've had enough fun, it's going to be your life. There will be no place in which you'll manage to hide, no project that you'll accomplish, no dream that you'll realize. I will always be there at the turn. I'll show you what it means, to betray the Donquixote Family."

//

I only find the strength to murmur a feeble "It's not for me that I fear".   
Limpid as a gunshot, clear as the sunlight, in my mind there's the insane smile of the Joker, brushed by the pink feathers of his coat. In the deep silence of the Heart Pirates' submarine, I still can hear the words he told me in that nightmare: " _I'd give my own life to see the shock on your face when you'll be holding Law's corpse in your arms_."


End file.
